Planning for, and responding to, severe weather
For information about recording absence during periods of severe weather, see the 'Recording absence' section.
As school staff and governors will appreciate, school closures disrupt children's education and make life very difficult for working parents who may not be able to make childcare arrangements at short notice. This in turn disrupts the services and businesses in which those parents work.
Schools should therefore plan for severe weather on the assumption that they will generally stay open. In the outbreaks of severe weather in early 2010, staff at many schools worked hard to keep their school open for the pupils who could get in. Of course exceptionally severe weather may disrupt even the best of plans.
As well as general information, such as how to contact pupils' families and staff, plans for severe weather could include:
- maintaining stocks of salt or grit
- identifying which walkways or areas need to be kept clear to allow people to get around the premises safely
- estimating how many staff members need to get in for the school to operate safely, if not to deliver the full normal curriculum.
You need to be clear who will make any decision about closure. In most cases this decision is delegated — rightly in the Department's view — to headteachers, who will know local weather and ground conditions, and the likely impact of the weather on the numbers of staff and pupils who will be able to get into school. In timing your decision, you need to balance the likely accuracy of weather forecasts against the benefits of early decisions to help parents and staff plan ahead; in many cases, decisions will however need to be taken in the hours immediately before the start of the school day.
As a decision-maker, you need to take a proportionate approach to assessing risks. Closing the school has a clear impact on children and families. Remaining open may increase risks arising from less supervision, longer journeys to and from school, minor slips and bumps, etc. There may be practical steps you can take to manage these increased risks, for example:
- reducing the extent to which children have to move between school buildings for different lessons
- bringing some classes together in the hall to ensure adequate supervision
- ending the school day early so that children do not get home too late (while making arrangements for children who cannot get collected by parents until later).
In some cases, closing your school will be the right decision. If you judge that children or staff will face significant risks of injury in school, or travelling to and from school, then a balanced decision may be that the school should close. Information about local road conditions will normally be available on local media, and the police may issue advice to travellers.
If you cannot get enough staff in to manage safely the expected numbers of pupils, closure may again be advisable. But you may wish to consider whether varying the school's activities for the day will enable you to operate safely with fewer staff.
When severe weather coincides with public examinations, you should make every effort to open for examination candidates even if the rest of the school is closed. In early 2010, schools and other examination centres made great efforts to enable candidates to take examinations, and very few centres had to close.
In exceptional circumstances, local authorities (LAs) may instruct all schools for which they are responsible — that is, all community and voluntary controlled schools — to close. LAs do not have the power to oblige foundation or voluntary aided schools, or academies, to close, but may come to an agreement with governing bodies that these schools will close if LA-wide closure seems necessary. In the context of severe weather, we would only expect LAs to take this approach if there were extreme circumstances, such as advice that all roads in an area were unsafe. In other cases LAs may wish to give a steer to schools to aid them in decision-making without directing or advising them to close.
Communicating closure to students and parents
You will appreciate the importance of timely and clear messages to parents and students. Different schools will use different methods and those who have closed in recent outbreaks of severe weather may wish to seek the views of parents and students on how the decision was communicated to them.
Supporting education if school closes
In some cases schools will need to close for a temporary period. In these cases, we hope that it may be possible to support pupils' learning during the closure, though the extent to which this will be possible will vary from school to school and may depend on the length of the closure. Guidance on planning for this is available to download from TeacherNet.
Mutual support and networking
We recognise that many members of staff will live some distance away from their schools and transport difficulties may prevent them reaching their school; they may however be able to get to another school nearer to their home.
Though this will not be possible everywhere, it may be possible in some instances for schools to agree between them that staff who cannot get to their own school should report to a more local school and help that school cover staff shortages. This may only be feasible where there is the possibility of arrangements being made in advance and set out in contingency plans, for example between federated schools or schools that work together in some form of network. We are however aware of at least one LA that is considering this on a broader scale, and will seek feedback from them as they take their plans forward.
Other LAs or schools may have developed other innovative ways of mitigating the effects of severe weather. If you have any ideas that you would wish to share, please send your details to incident.alert@dcsf.gsi.gov.uk.
More information
- Frequently asked questions regarding schools and severe weather.
- Questions and answers on examinations in severe weather.
- Guidance on supporting learning during extended school closures. (PDF and Word versions available.)
- Find information on sensible risk management from the HSE.
- Find out about local conditions forecast for your area by checking the Met Office website.
- Information about minimum and maximum temperatures in classrooms
Last updated: 23 March 2010
